


Now hide inside me

by zimriya



Series: The last flame of my life (a Homin ABO AU) [11]
Category: DBSK | Tohoshinki | TVfXQ | TVXQ
Genre: Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Canon Compliant, Domestic Fluff, Fluff and Smut, Kid Fic, M/M, Mating Bond, Mating Cycles/In Heat, Mildly Dubious Consent, Mpreg, POV Outsider, alpha changmin, because there is a heat and i want to be safe instead of sorry, omega yunho
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-28
Updated: 2018-09-04
Packaged: 2019-07-03 21:52:36
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 13,647
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15827652
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zimriya/pseuds/zimriya
Summary: In 2021, Yunho says, “Changmin, let’s have a baby.” Canon AU.





	1. conception

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Note: This fic is more compilatory than all previous. It is, for lack of a better word, a dumping ground for anything about the children in the ABO universe. 
> 
> Reading the previous fics is not necessary, however, probably would be helpful for background information. You should definitely probably at least read **[I remember when our feelings smudged together](https://archiveofourown.org/works/15796434)** , because that has some pretty necessary background. 
> 
> Title is from 'Puzzle' by Yunho. Is anyone surprised. 
> 
> Betaed by Hexmen and Kinah. I made Scar make sure the kids weren’t talking too much for their ages. All other mistakes are my own.
> 
> [PRIMER](http://zimriya.tumblr.com/aboau).

**Now hide inside me**

 

\--

**1\. Conception**

\--

In 2021, Yunho says, “Changminnie-yah.”

Changmin raises his head.

Yunho says, “We’ve been married a month.”

Changmin lifts his eyebrow.

Yunho says, “Let’s have a baby.”

Changmin tries to choke on his own tongue. “Okay,” he says.

Yunho glares at him.

Changmin stares back at him. “What?” he says. “What--”

“That’s all you have to say?” Yunho says. He’s staring at Changmin with a pout marring his expression and Changmin has a terrible urge to kiss it away.

“Yes?” Changmin says. He’s only asking a little.

Yunho sighs, but then goes back to fooling around on his phone in their dressing room.

Changmin watches him for a few more minutes with baited breath, before doing the same. “It’s going to take a lot of planning,” he says.

“I was thinking we shouldn’t tour this half of the year,” Yunho says at almost the same time.

Changmin meets his gaze.

Yunho holds it together for all of two seconds before laughing, breathless and high and like he can’t quite believe it.

Changmin reaches out and gently extricates the phone from Yunho’s hand.

Yunho’s got the thing open to KakaoTalk. _Congratulations_ , the message says. Changmin sets it aside without pausing. “Who’d you tell?”

“Boa,” Yunho says happily.

Changmin doesn’t so much as twitch. Four years of a public, committed relationship will do that to you; getting married in an equally public (in the sense that everyone knew it was happening; only friends and family were invited) ceremony only the month before has definitely helped. “Ah,” he says.

Yunho has taken hold of Changmin’s hands and is smiling at him. “So,” he says.

“So,” Changmin agrees.

“Let’s have a baby, Changdol-ah,” Yunho says.

Changmin kisses him.

\--

Changmin ought to be worried that the day of Yunho’s heat dawns hot, humid, and with Kim Heechul-emerged from some godforsaken void looking far too cheerful for eight in the morning to collect Taehee and Dohyun.

It’s June, it’s stifling, and Changmin apparently somehow managed to fight off the urge to mount his husband long enough to dress both of his children in matching, frankly adorable outfits.

Taehee’s is blue. Dohyun’s is purple. Both of them have matching, designer shoes.

Heechul-hyung squints down at his godchildren and lifts both perfectly groomed eyebrows at Changmin.

Changmin stares back at him with Taehee’s Frozen backpack in one hand like some sort of peace offering and lifts his own eyebrow.

Heechul-hyung’s mouth parts.

“Oppa,” Taehee chirps, tugging on Heechul-hyung’s shirt hem, an immediate, adorable distraction. “Hi.”

“Samchon,” Changmin corrects automatically, twitching. “Heechul-samchon. Don’t call him _oppa_. Hyung, I’ll kill you--”

“Aw, Changmin, I didn’t realize our parents were related!” Heechul-hyung says, ruffling Changmin’s hair.

Changmin pulls away from him, flustered. “That is not how family trees work, Hyung,” he says.

Heechul-hyung ignores him, too busy cooing down at Taehee and Dohyun.

“Chullie-samchon.” Dohyun is standing next to his sister with one thumb in his mouth and the other hand tightly gripping Taehee’s. His words come out slurred.

He’s so cute Changmin doesn’t want to ever let him out of his sight.

“Hello,” Heechul-hyung says cheerfully. He waves down at both twins.

Both twins wave back.

Taehee has bows in her hair.

Dohyun’s shoe laces are tied.

Changmin did a lot for his children, apparently, despite the fact the first thing he did this morning was roll over, inhale Yunho, and determine they had about five or so hours to get the kids out of the house and safely under the care of their various friends and godparents.

Taehee and Dohyun are _adorable_.

More than usual, anyway.

(They have Yunho’s eyes. Changmin thinks it’s unfair; Yunho’s eyes on their children are _adorable_.)

“Chul-oppa? Kyu-samchon?” Taehee says.

Changmin narrows his eyes.

Heechul-hyung fucking smirks. “We might go see Kyu-oppa,” he says.

Changmin wants to fight him. “Hyung.”

Heechul-hyung’s eyes flash, but he doesn’t correct himself. “Oh, we better rush, Taehee-yah,” he says instead, in fake whisper, bending down to look into Changmin’s daughter’s eyes. “It sounds like Chwang-appa is cranky.”

“She’s been able to say Changmin since she turned two, you asshole,” Changmin snaps, and regrets it immediately.

Dohyun pulls his hand free of his mouth to blink up at Changmin with wide, innocent eyes. “Asshole?” he says.

Heechul-hyung has hoisted Taehee and claimed the Frozen backpack and is practically cackling back in Changmin’s direction.

“No, Dohyun-ah, don’t. Don’t’ say that,” Changmin says, pinching the bridge of his nose. “Heechul-hyung!”

Heechul-hyung manages to stop laughing long enough to turn around with Taehee in his arms.

“You’re missing one,” Changmin says. He bends to pick up Dohyun, making sure to press kisses to the boy’s cheeks and run fingers in between the boy’s ribs, and the transfer goes as best as it ever has, given the fact that Yunho bowed out of child-rearing this morning with the incredibly lucid excuse of ‘I am leaking out of my ass because of you. Don’t touch me until your children aren’t in the room next door.’

The twins are getting to be too big for anyone to hold them at the same time, let alone Heechul-hyung, who’s slim and in shape and still unfairly pretty.

He tries anyway, giving up with exaggerated groaning, before taking Dohyun’s backpack and Dohyun’s hand, and bowing his way back out of the door with both of Changmin’s children in tow.

Changmin watches them go with all the nervous energy of a new parent, before giving himself a metaphorical slap to the face, and heading back into the bedroom to find his husband.

Yunho isn’t in bed anymore.

The shower is going.

Changmin takes a few moments to breathe in the smell of the other man’s heat. He sheds a few clothes.

Yunho’s singing a song off their last album.

Changmin trips over sticky pajama bottoms.

The bathroom door isn’t locked.

“Mm,” Yunho says when Changmin slips in behind him, perfectly happy to have been interrupted mid song. “Did you get rid of the kids?”

Changmin isn’t sure if he wants to kiss Yunho first, or shout at him about how they’ve turned into the worst domestic version of themselves.

“You should have thought of that before you knocked me up, Changdol-ah,” Yunho says, taking the decision away from Changmin with all the uncanny, mind-reading ability twenty-one years will do for a relationship.

Changmin flushes a little at him and scowls. “Hey,” he says. “You wanted it.”

Yunho grins at him, more than a little dopey. “So very much,” he says. “You should do it again.”

Changmin blinks. “Knock you up?”

Yunho snorts at him. “No, asshole, fuck me,” he says. He drops both hands on Changmin’s ass and sighs. “Did you take your pills?”

Changmin leans in close to breathe in directly from the source instead of just dirty used sheets, and feels his cock swell and harden in response. “No,” he says. “I married you instead.”

Yunho grins. “Thought so,” he breathes. “Now what are you waiting for?”

Changmin rocks their cocks together with calculated ease. “You to finish cleaning yourself,” he says.

Yunho shifts his hips back and forth a few times. “Wasn’t cleaning,” he says.

Changmin glances down. “There’s soap.”

“Friction,” Yunho says a little mindlessly, clearly distracted now that he’s got something to thrust against, and that something is the love of his life. “Was too. Hard,”

Changmin’s mouth rounds out around a bad pun.

Yunho groans and drops his head into the center of Changmin’s chest. “You’re so lame, Changminnie-yah,” he says. “Why would I ever let you put your dick in my ass?”

Changmin laces his hands behind Yunho’s back and hugs him a little, lifting him up onto the balls of his feet and grinning when Yunho’s scent goes lust-filled. “I don’t know,” he says. “I’m very good at it, though.”

Yunho lifts his head and finally kisses him, utterly used to Changmin at this point. “Yes, you are, now fucking commit, Changdol,” he says.

Changmin kisses him back without much complaint, then wraps his left hand around Yunho’s dick in response. The metal of his ring is cool and contrasting with the heat of Yunho’s skin.

Yunho whines.

Changmin lets his hand just sit circled around Yunho’s cock. “I’ve more than committed, I think you’ll find,” he says.

Yunho glowers at him. “You’re more than a tease,” he corrects, and then pulls free of Changmin’s hands without so much as a flinch.

Changmin listens to him drag water all throughout the house, and sighs. He runs fingers through his hair. He lets the water roar in his ears. He turns it off, steps out of the tub, grabs one towel, and follows.

“If you’re not in the bedroom in two minutes I’m locking the door,” Yunho says, right around the time Changmin comes into the bedroom moderately more dry.

Changmin tosses the towel directly into his face, scowling, and pointedly crosses to where he knows Yunho keeps the sex toys.

Yunho doesn’t move out from underneath the towel.

“I should burn these,” Changmin says, one hand full of Kyungtae the other hand holding Hyuntae.

“You’d be out two kids and a career,” Yunho replies immediately.

Changmin rolls his eyes, and growls despite himself.

Yunho’s for sure smirking underneath the terrycloth. “Changdol, they’re toys,” he says.

“Toys you still have even though everyone knows I’m fucking you,” Changmin snaps, before crossing back to their doorway and, after a mild, angry pause, chucking both sex toys into the nearest room.

It’s the twins’ room.

Changmin’s so lucky Yunho is still wearing the towel.

Changmin shuts the door for good measure, and crosses back towards his bed. He swipes the towel off of Yunho’s face.

His husband stares up at him with round, perfect eyes--the eyes he gave their children--and smiles at him with petal-perfect lips.

Changmin forgets all about Kyungtae and Hyuntae and whatever-the-heck-else-tae; he gets on both knees and takes Yunho by the chin and kisses him, hot and heady and all the way up to tongue and teeth and moaning before they’ve finished getting the towel out from between the two of them.

The sheets are soaking and Changmin really doesn’t even care, already so far gone on Yunho’s taste that he has half a mind to just strip the bed and fuck him on it bare, but then he has the good graces to hoist Yunho up with both hands and try to convey to him via tongue alone that Yunho should take the towel and shove it under his hips.

“It won’t help,” Yunho mumbles in between kisses without even opening his eyes. “I’m leaking--”

“We are not buying a new mattress because your heat happened to happen on our anniversary, Yunho-yah,” Changmin snaps, pulling away from Yunho’s already frowning, pouting mouth. “Sit on the damn towel.”

Yunho stares up at him with round eyes and frowns even harder. “I’d much rather sit on your dick,” he starts to say, then breaks off on a gasp when Changmin helps to make that a reality. It’s a coordinated, highly sophisticated move: Changmin ending up ass down on the towel with Yunho straddling his lap staring down at the bridge of Changmin’s nose like it’ll help him get the air back into his lungs.

Changmin is really fucking proud of himself, to be completely fucking honest. Pornstars wish they were this good.

Yunho narrows his eyes at Changmin. “Changdollie.”

Changmin shifts on the bed a little, trying to get more comfortable.

“You’re thinking about porn again,” Yunho says.

Changmin squints back at him. “You’re reading my mind again,” he says.

Yunho sits more heavily down on him. “I’ve known you for twenty-one years,” he says. “Get over it.” He puts one hand in the center of Changmin’s chest and holds, rocking around on Changmin’s abs to the point where they’re slippery and messy from the slick steadily leaking out of him.

Changmin is distracted and aroused and wants to relocate them to a less wet portion of the bed, preferably near the headboard, so he can put Yunho in handcuffs and eat him out until he’s sobbing, but before he can do that, before he can open his mouth to parse that, Yunho is contenting himself with positioning and leaning down to kiss Changmin utterly breathless and senseless.

“Mmm,” Changmin says, and kisses back. He lets himself mold into the sink of their mattress and puts both hands in Yunho’s hands and just holds, content to let Yunho do the rest of it. The hand that had been on Changmin’s chest stays there, rubbing over Changmin’s ribcage and nipples like Yunho isn’t really thinking about it. The other one goes down to Changmin’s cock, bypasses the swell of his knot for the tip, and teases fingers along the slit of him in time to the lick of Yunho’s tongue against Changmin’s teeth.

Changmin feels his ring start to snag on Yunho’s hair and growls, pulling away from Yunho to set about getting himself free.

Yunho giggles at him.

Changmin glowers at him. “You’re hilarious--” he tries to say.

“If you’d been quicker about getting rid of the kids I wouldn’t have showered and I’d still be wearing the bracelet,” Yunho says before he can finish.

Changmin gets his hand free and slaps it down on Yunho’s ass on a whine, taken aback by the image of that. “Hyung.”

“Just the bracelet,” Yunho says, uncaring. He’s rocking his hips into the mess he’s made of Changmin’s abs now, and Changmin absolutely cannot look down to see him do that. It’s hard enough keeping from following that train of thought to Yunho’s dick covered in his own slick so that they don’t have to risk being seen in a convenience store buying blatant supplies to fuck each other now that everyone knows they’re married and is invasively invested in the ins and outs of their sex life. If Changmin follows that train further, he’ll trip and die in the tracks because the only other time Yunho gets his cock wet with his own slick is when he’s two seconds from fucking Changmin until he can’t even remember his own name, their two lovely children sharing it bedamned.

And.

Changmin scowls and groans and hates the fact that that’s where his brain has gone, next door, to the twins’ room, and the sex toys Changmin stashed there.

Yunho looks down at Changmin’s face, still clearly having been going off on his tangent about wearing just the bracelet he gave Changmin in 2014 on his cock and stops rocking his hips. “Changdol?”

“I put Kyungtae and Hyuntae in the kids’ room,” Changmin says a bit miserably. “I should get up and make it so I have not have done that.”

Yunho goes cross eyed at Changmin’s sentence structure.

Changmin goes cross eyed at Changmin’s sentence structure.

Yunho frowns at him. “You’re making fun of me,” he says. “I’m going to take the kids home to see Mom and Dad and make it so they have accents too.”

Changmin slaps him on the arm. “No kid talk,” he says.

Yunho glares at him. “You literally started it,” he says.

Changmin smacks him again. “No kid talk,” he says.

Yunho snarls. “So put your dick in me, then,” he says.

Changmin glances down once to gauge positioning, takes Yunho by both hips, and does so.

It’s glorious.

Yunho’s eyes go shut and his nostrils flare and his head drops down to rest under Changmin’s chin.

Changmin stares up at the ceiling and tries not to knot immediately. It’s been ten years. He should not be this close to knotting after ten damn years.

Like clockwork, Yunho lifts up so that he’s not completely sprawled only supported on Changmin’s rock hard dick. “If you knot me before I get a chance to come I’m leaving you,” he says.

Changmin scowls at him. He puts on hand on the back of Yunho’s head and the other in the center of his back. “Put your legs around me.”

Yunho lifts his head up as much as he can to look at Changmin. “I’m straddling you--”

“Good, hold on,” Changmin says, and lifts them both around so that they’re mostly flipped: Yunho lying mostly on one ass cheek, and Changmin somehow still unexpectedly inside him.

Yunho yelps, ducks back into Changmin’s embrace somewhat frantically, but Changmin is too busy trying not to bite off his own tongue at how good it feels. The surprise made Yunho clench down more than simple biology, and any hope Changmin had at not knotting before he had a chance to give Yunho and orgasm is well and truly out the window.

“Changdol!” Yunho’s voice hasn’t come back down a few octaves yet but Changmin is too busy trying to remember how to breathe to tease him. “You dick!”

“You love my dick,” Changmin says, mostly air, and finishes rolling them so that Yunho’s more solidly on his back and staring up at him with pink streaked across both cheeks and down the center of his chest.

Changmin’s still soft enough to slip out a little.

Yunho doesn’t look pleased about that.

Changmin resettles Yunho’s legs around his waist, and sinks in to the swelling hilt.

“Oh,” Yunho says, eyelids fluttering. “Kay, well--”

“You like coming on my knot,” Changmin tells him, pleased. Yunho’s nipples have ended up right in front of Changmin’s face, and Changmin really wants to lean down and bite them. He’s only been able to do so for a few months, since weaning isn’t exactly an exact science, and it turns out even Jung ‘so I understand you want me to buy myself a butt plug for you’ Yunho had a line.

Changmin leans down to take the left one in between his teeth.

Yunho whines and tosses his head. “But I want you to fuck me, not just sit in me--”

Changmin takes the opportunity to thrust a few times up against Yunho’s prostate. He softens his mouth around Yunho’s nipple and hums.

Yunho goes red and twitchy and starts yanking on Changmin’s hair. “Don’t you dare--”

Changmin pulls off him with a grin, but kisses Yunho to try to make up for it. “Sorry,” he says. “It really was an accident.”

Yunho just glares at him behind his flush. “Sure,” he says.

Changmin keeps grinning. Then he switches tactics, because he’s can already feel himself starting to expand to the point where pulling out is going to be out of the question. He settles his weight more evenly on his arms, then takes the opportunity to kiss all along Yunho’s cheeks and nose, before taking the man’s mouth and cock simultaneously--one with his lips, one with his hands.

Yunho moans immediately so the kiss has no tongue or finesse, but Yunho also goes tight and clenching equally immediately, so Changmin hisses and groans and fucks in deep a few more times before he starts to knot and come.

“God, fine,” Yunho says into the mess between their mouths. “I don’t mind coming on your knot--”

“You love coming on my knot,” Changmin says, tugging and working at Yunho’s cock just a hint hard enough that Yunho whines and twists and brings the fact that they’re tying into sharp, dragging awareness.

“Oh--I do--I do--I do,” Yunho blurts out, lost to it, when Changmin drags a nail underneath the crown of his cock and circles his hips a few glorious times in response to the way Yunho is suddenly so tight that Changmin doesn’t know if he’ll ever be able to pull free.

“Told you,” he says.

“Changdol--stop _talking_ \--”

Yunho comes with a beautiful, bowed back and tightly shut leaking eyes, twisted away from Changmin like he can’t quite decide if he likes it or if he never ever wants to do it again, and Changmin follows him over with a drawn out sigh, face pressed against his neck and wrist aching from the angle to keep jerking Yunho off through the whole of it.

Changmin spends the next fifteen minutes whispering praise and love songs right up against Yunho’s throat. He can’t hear, because his ears are too far away; he doesn’t need to, because they’ve been together ten years and Yunho’s heard everything.

When they finally start to slip free, Yunho sighs. “Missed you,” he says.

Changmin lifts his suddenly exhausted head and squints. “You missed me?”

“Heat,” Yunho corrects, still boneless and happy. “I missed you and heat.”

Changmin keeps squinting at him. “Well, it was only one year without heat,” Changmin says. “And also, aren’t you the only one saying how the only good thing about heat is the fact that I don’t have to work as hard to give you more than one orgasm?”  

Yunho still blushes at him, even after ten years and two kids and one very beautiful yet somehow still too public wedding. “I feel bad,” he says. “Don’t make fun of me.”

Changmin blinks at him. “Make fun of you?”

“I just want to be good for you, Changdol,” Yunho says. He’s starting to go hot again, eyes half lidded, limbs restless, and shifting like he’ll shake out of his skin if Changmin pulls all the way free of him. “I hate it when I disappoint you.”

Changmin is very quickly starting to get the picture. “Oh?” he says.

Yunho nods, already starting to shake even though Changmin hasn’t pulled out of him at all. “Now please--can I have another one--”

Changmin narrows his eyes at him and does a cursory look around their bedroom. “Water,” he says. “We need water.”

“You can just walk me to the kitchen--”

“I am not walking you to the kitchen. That’s pointless,” Changmin retorts immediately. “Also, don’t pretend you won’t distract me and end up having me on the kitchen counter.”

Yunho’s eyes go hazy and his sighs. “But wouldn't that be amazing, Changdollie? You love food the most in the world after me.”

“And our beautifully absent children,” Changmin says dryly, to hide how the tips of his ears are flushing. “Who will eventually have to come home, and eat in that kitchen, and touch that counter--”

“Okay fine,” Yunho says, flopping down on the bed under Changmin with a groan. “Go get your bottled water.”

Changmin kisses him on the mouth in thanks. “I’m sorry I’m the smartest person in the house,” he says.

Yunho keeps his hand over his eyes. “That’s definitely our daughter,” he says. “Don’t even try, Changdol.”

Changmin kisses him one more time, and gets to his feet cackling. “My genes,” he says. “She gets the smarts from me.”

“She certainly gets something from you,” Yunho calls after him, already jerking off. “Now hurry back, you dick, or I really will lock the door.

“The sex toys really are in the kids’ room,” Changmin shouts back at him from the hallway. “Even in heat, and desperate, there’s no way you’re going in there.” He grins. “We’d have to get them a whole new room.”

“Shut up,” Yunho calls back at him. “Less talking, more walking.”

Changmin keeps grinning all the way into the kitchen and all the way to the fridge.

He gets out two reusable water bottles and is filling them up with water thinking recycling has its downsides and this is one of them, when his hip itches and he reaches down to scratch, and then nearly brains himself on the trash can stepping back to turn off the sink.

“Ow--fuck--” Changmin starts to swear, glaring at the thing, and then stops.

Trash cans.

Trash cans are an important part of fucking Yunho when they’re both not on pills because they’re adults, married, have children, and SM Entertainment no longer gets to tell them not to have children.

Trash cans are where Changmin is supposed to be putting the condom.

Changmin definitely did not use a condom.

Changmin definitely did not _remember_ to use a condom.

 _Yunho_ definitely did not remember to remind Changmin to use a condom.

Changmin stares down at his still moderately aroused, traitorous, _naked_ dick, and wonders why it took him so long to realize that Yunho wasn’t being nearly as vocal and complain-y about the fact that the condom was keeping Changmin from properly filling him up.

Then he tries to remember what it was their doctor had said when they found out the twins were the twins. Something about them being lucky, for sure, since Yunho’s age, and Yunho’s gender, and TVXQ’s lifestyle. But the pregnancy had gone well, the twins had turned out to be the best thing that had ever happened to them, and… maybe they’d get lucky and absolutely nothing would happen this time around?

“Well, fuck,” Changmin says, which is about the time Yunho comes padding out into the kitchen, naked, and scowling.

“The water’s still on,” he says foremost pointing. “You fucker.”

Changmin reaches over to turn it off on autopilot.

“Also, what’s taking you so long--”

“Yunho-hyung,” Changmin says, still staring down at his dick.

Yunho keeps walking towards him looking unimpressed. “What?” He stops in front of Changmin, and normally Changmin would take the opportunity to look at Yunho’s dick, maybe drop to his knees and swallow down Yunho’s dick, but instead he lifts his eyes to look at the slope of Yunho’s stomach, the white, raised line where the twins came out of him standing in stark contrast to the tan of his skin.

It’s June.

They were, until nature called and they decided to be irresponsible idiots, prepping for a Japanese tour. And A-Nation.

A-Nation is next month.

Changmin swallows.

“Changmin-ah?”

Changmin finally manages to drag his attention away from Yunho’s stomach to back to his face. “Hyung, we forgot the condom,” he says quickly, staring deep into Yunho’s eyes.

Yunho’s brow furrows.

Changmin puts his hand pointedly on Yunho’s hips, then stares down at the scar along his abdomen.

Yunho follows Changmin’s gaze.

Yunho makes the connection.

Yunho.

Yunho sits down in the middle of their kitchen, dragging Changmin alongside him.

For a moment, they sit in relatively awkward silence, not meeting each other’s eyes.

Finally:

“I mean, I could give you an enema?” Changmin tries.

Yunho slaps him on the arm, hard.

“Right, bad idea,” Changmin agrees. “Sorry.”

Yunho lilts to the side and forward until he’s resting his head against Changmin’s chest. “We’ve got a tour next year,” he says.

Changmin swallows. “We’ll cancel.”

Yunho laughs. “Yeah, that’ll go over well.”

“We’ll _cancel_.”

“We need to wait two weeks,” Yunho says. “Then we’ll know.”

Changmin swallows. “Yeah.”

He stares down at their hands, half intertwined around Yunho’s hips. His bite mark looks back at him almost mockingly.

Reading his mind, Yunho eases Changmin’s hand to rest there, sighing. “I mean,” he says.

“I’ve always wanted three,” Changmin says at the same time, lifting his head to look deep into Yunho’s eyes. “Oh, erm.”

Yunho kisses him, soft and sweet and well counter to the early froth of heat. “Me too,” he says quietly.

Changmin finds his eyes darting back down to look at Yunho’s stomach.

Yunho follows his gaze and tightens his grip on Changmin’s hand.

Changmin’s ass cheek throbs.

“We should still probably use a condom for the rest of my heat, though,” Yunho says after a few more moment of beautiful, cautious silence. “To be safe.”

“Yeah,” Changmin agrees. He’s not sure he wants to get up. “But, um.”

“The kids are walking,” says Yunho, knowing what Changmin wants immediately.

Changmin makes a face.

“You’re the one who objected to the counters,” Yunho says. “At least they won’t be crawling across the floor--”

“Yeah, that’s not motivating me to put my dick back in you, Yunho-yah,” Changmin says dryly, even though his thighs are thrumming with eager energy.

“Uh huh.” Yunho can for sure smell that. “You’re a bad liar, Changminnie.”

“Only for you,” Changmin says, and kisses him.

There are no condoms in the kitchen.

Changmin meets Yunho’s eyes, sees only love and affection and tiny, growing confidence, and leans in to kiss him anyway.

They really might as well.

\--

“So, uh, Eomeonim,” Yunho says, into the phone. He’s whispering and Changmin is three paces from being close enough to take the phone from him. “You’re going to have more grandchildren, love you, bye,” Yunho finishes in a rush, and cackles when Changmin finally grabs for him and takes the phone.

“Yunho-hyung!”

“That was your mother. My entire family will know by sundown,” Yunho says, gleefully. “You have to tell Taehee and Dohyun.”

Changmin doesn’t even have words. “Yunho-hyung!”

“Also, I thought about making a huge fuss about peeing on the stick again but this is more fun.”

“Yunho-hyung!” Changmin says, cheeks red, heart racing, having run home immediately upon getting a text from Yunho two weeks from their little heat fiasco that just said, _If I tell mom and dad will you tell Taehee and Dohyun?_   “They are two years old!”

“And six months,” Yunho says. “They’re old enough to know where babies come from.”

Changmin can already feel his eye twitching. “They are absolutely _not old enough to know where babies come from_ \--”

“Changdol, not everyone is a raging pervert who asks lots of questions,” Yunho says.

Changmin feels heat flood his cheeks. “I regret ever introducing you to my mother!”

“Your mother loves me,” Yunho says. “We have a lot in common, both of us have had you inside us--”

“I am! Going to _divorce_ you!” Changmin shouts, face on _fire_.

“Just tell them they come from me,” Yunho finishes gleefully. “If they want more details, that’s really not my fault.”

Changmin grinds his teeth together and tries to tell himself the fact that he’s about to have three children is wonderful, beautiful news.

“Clearly, it’s yours,” Yunho continues. “Since you watch all the porn in this house.”

“I’m telling them _all_ babies come from you,” Changmin tells him angrily, and stalks further into their house to do just that.

\--

end.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Unprotected sex is bad kids. Babies happen. Yunho and Changmin love Yeonhee unconditionally (I realized belatedly her name isn't in this and I am HORRIFIED clearly I need to let the muse calm and then force it to write more kids) and are also able to have her so like. It's a moot point in their case BUT JUST. CONDOMS ARE IMPORTANT WHEN BABIES CAN HAPPEN. /steps off soapbox. 
> 
> This chapter is set May 2021 and June 2023 respectively. The twins are a year and six months, or two in Korean age. (If you want. I can totally tell you allll about the kids' names. All three of them have hanja meanings and backstory lol. Cest moi.)
> 
> Tumblr masterpost || [Twitter masterpost](https://twitter.com/zimriya/status/1034629115448631296)


	2. cravings

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is set 2021 and 2023 respectively. The twins are a one and eight months or so, so around two in Korean age.
> 
> Betaed by Hexmen and Kinah. I made Scar make sure the kids weren’t talking too much for their ages. All other mistakes are my own.

**2\. Cravings**

\--

Yunho’s cravings are… excessive.

Expensive, Changmin would say.

The sort of thing that has him up late nights online trying to figure out what the fucking heck they even mean, beyond that his unborn children have somehow managed to inherit his palette and appreciation for good food. Naver and Google hold absolutely no answers to Changmin’s midnight questions; his mother hasn’t managed to stop laughing at him since he and Yunho stopped in on their post wedding rounds to inform their families they weren’t going to be using condoms for Yunho’s 2020 heat; and _Yunho’s_ mother, while significantly more helpful than either of them, simply offers him words of encouragement and then hangs up on him.

It is near midnight.

Changmin gets it.

Changmin would also like to survive the next thirty-eight weeks.

So, he calls Choi Chef-hyungnim.

Never let it be said that Changmin is in anyway proud about this.

\--

“You’re lucky I like you,” Choi Chef-hyungnim says, barely through the door into his and Yunho’s apartment.

Yunho left to bother Donghae-hyung in a huff about the third time Changmin tried to spoon-feed him his latest attempt at satisfying their unborn children’s ridiculous cravings, only to return instead with _Heechul-hyung_ (and Changmin was going to figure out a way to murder Lee Donghae without getting murdered himself by Lee Hyukjae for that). They vanished into the master bedroom and haven’t appeared since, hidden behind music and an unlocked but solidly closed door.

Changmin’s nearly worn through the floor of the hallway, thanked the lord that he has to keep his nails short because he’s married and getting some on the regular, and thus could not bite them raw, and is honestly so thankful to see Choi Chef-hyungnim that he doesn’t even try to hush the man.

Just because Changmin’s been whispering and walking on literal eggshells doesn’t mean Choi Chef-hyungnim needs to.

“Changmin-ah.” Choi Chef-hyungnim is still standing in Changmin and Yunho’s doorway holding his bag wearing both shoes. The man looks supremely unimpressed.

“Sorry.” Changmin hurries forward to take the man’s coat, then the man’s bag, then stands awkwardly as Choi Chef-hyungnim removes his shoes and sets them neatly beside Changmin’s, Yunho’s and Heechul-hyung’s.

Changmin tires not to look down at them and snarl.

“You’re lucky I like you,” Chef Choi-hyungnim says again, taking back his bag.

Changmin winces. “I’ll give you the first one?” he says. “Or free concert tickets?”

“I thought you weren’t doing concerts,” Choi Chef-hyungnim says. He’s shifts the bag a little, and the contents most definitely look like ingredients and Changmin honestly wants to marry the man. He’s also right.

Yunho and Changmin aren’t doing much of anything these days, beyond being seen out in public as the world’s most besotted and sought-after power couple, or whatever it is Youngmin-seonsaengnim likes to call them.

Love sells, romance is the world’s best product, and SM hasn’t had press like this since Yunho and Changmin got married back in December. It was the wedding of the century, historic because they were South Korea’s first gay couple, but even more so, because 2021 was the first year SM let them spend an April together out of the public eye. 2018 Yunho had been away filming _Dunia_. 2019 Changmin had been out getting shitfaced with his newly discharged best friend. 2020 they’d been quietly in the same country on the same break, but made sure to post on Instagram at two very different important functions.

Since Yunho started showing up to airport bundled under layers and smelling quote ‘not at all like anything at all’ the fans have been practically frothing for the news, once it came: Jung Yunho, U Know Yunho, Gwangju’s first omega Special Class Soldier, one half of the Kings of Japan, Shim Changmin’s other half, was expecting.

It’s been great.

But concerts and international flights had been strictly out of the question once Yunho hit the point where their doctor had to pull them aside and tell them that not only had they somehow crossed the insurmountable odds of a successful omega male pregnancy, but they’d managed to do it twice over, because they were having twins.

“We aren’t,” Changmin tells Choi Chef-hyungnim, fully aware that the amount of time that has elapsed is well beyond normal. “But--the first one? Isn’t that a thing, you promise? A firstborn?” He has an odd moment of deja vu, and thinks back to a hospital visit from hell, and is thankful for the sobering of the memory.

“You realize I’m married, yes?” Choi Chef-hyungnim says dryly. “I know firsthand what would happen if you had to tell Yunho that you’d given away half of your newborns before they so much as screamed their way into this world.”

Changmin swallows.

“Although, going solo doesn’t work if you have to murder your partner to do it,” Choi Chef-hyungnim finishes. “I’d imagine that a murder charge would put a damper on things.”

Changmin kind of wants to marry Choi Chef-hyungnim.

He doesn’t say that. Choi Chef-hyungnim would not marry him, and Yunho would actually divorce him if he did. He’d hear, somehow, even over the music and Heechul-hyung’s wit. Changmin has no doubt they’re sleeping--Yunho has been perpetually tired, it seems--and Yunho has always been able to sleep like the dead if he’s angry. Now that he’s sleeping for three, it’s only gotten worse.

It freaks Changmin out, setting instincts that usually go to sleep the moment he’s got his knot in Yunho on edge, and ending more often than not with Changmin leaned in close to listen to Yunho breathe, and Yunho staring down at him with mild concern in his too beautiful, too perfect eyes.

Pregnancy has grown out Yunho’s lashes.

Changmin’s sisters, Jihye, Heechul-hyung, and even Boa-noona assure Changmin that is not a thing.

Changmin begs to fucking differ.

“Changmin-ah.” Choi Chef-hyungnim looks positively done. “What do you need me to make?”

Changmin ducks his head, embarrassed. “Pastries,” he mutters. Even he has to admit he’s slurring the word beyond recognition.

Choi Chef-hyungnim looks at Changmin with an impressive amount of patience. “I’m sorry, what?” he says.

“Pastries,” Changmin says again, louder this time. “He wants me to make cheesecake.”

Choi Chef-hyungnim blinks. “Cheesecake is not hard.”

“I ruined all the bread I touched,” Changmin points out mildly, trying for blasé, but he ends up sounding more than a little hurt. He would wince, but to wince would be to show weakness. Kyuhyun is his best friend. Changmin knows better than to show weakness.

“That was three years ago,” Choi Chef-hyungnim says. “You were nervous.”

“The love of my life is currently craving cheesecake because he’s pregnant with our twins,” Changmin says. “I am _terrified_.”

“But good terrified,” Choi Chef-hyungnim says wisely. “You could make cheesecake like this.”

“Chocolate cheesecake,” Changmin admits finally. “He says he wants chocolate and cheese.” His brow starts to furrow. “In a cake. Together. For some. Horrible reason--maybe only one of them likes cheese. I hope it’s Boob. I don’t think deer like cheese.”

Choi Chef-hyungnim is staring at Changmin like much of Changmin and Yunho’s friends stared at him when they started dropping the children’s fetal names onto Instagram and into casual conversation. “What?”

“The kids,” Changmin hurries to say. “Boob and Water Deer.”

Choi Chef-hyungnim’s left eye definitely twitches.

Changmin tables the discussion of how his children received their names. “Anyway, chocolate cheesecake.”  He shrugs a bit more. “Is what Yunho wants. From me. The world’s _worst_ pastry chef.” He smiles a self-deprecating smile. It comes easily and is standard, this far along into Yunho’s pregnancy. “Laugh now. Yunho thought it was hilarious before he stalked off with Heechul-hyung.”

Heechul-hyung is there, in their bedroom, cuddling Yunho because Yunho wants him to cuddle him, and Changmin is out in the kitchen with Choi Chef-hyungnim covered in a full bottle of scent blockers so as to not smell so pissed off about that. He’d actually managed to worry himself into forgetting, only now he’s remembered, and every inch of him wants to run Heechul-hyung far, far away.

Yunho won’t have that, one because Yunho won’t be owned, but two, Yunho can’t figure out why Changmin’s gotten _more_ possessive. “I’m full of your babies,” he says every time, head tilting to one side. “Plural. Two of your babies. Two of your sperm made babies in me and you’re acting like nobody in the world knows I let you put your dick in me.” He sours, every time, because some part of Yunho has gotten more _into_ the possession thing. Every other sentence wants to end with ‘everybody can see that you _own_ me.’ Changmin knows better than to say anything.

Choi Chef-hyungnim claps suddenly in front of Changmin’s face. “Changmin-ah,” he says. “Concentrate.”

Changmin blinks rapidly.

“You’ve burned your cheesecake.”

Changmin looks down at the nonexistent oven he isn’t standing in front of.

“Metaphorically,” Choi Chef-hyungnim continues, clearly done with Changmin. “I see why you called me.”

Changmin will take that hit. “Yes,” he says. “I really need your help.”

“Clearly,” Choi Chef-hyungnim says.

Changmin frowns at him. “Hey,” he says, reminded of how amused Yunho had been when he’s realized what he wanted from Changmin was _baking_. It really had been rather rude of Yunho. Changmin ought to spank him or something. Or… something.

Choi Chef-hyungnim frowns at him. “Stop that,” he says, like some sort of mind reader. “He’s carrying your children.”

“Our children,” Changmin corrects automatically, with the patience of someone who is friends with Cho Kyuhyun. “They’re Yunho’s too.”

“If it’s ‘we’re pregnant’ it’s ‘our children,’ now shut up and stop laughing this is going to be your future one day too,” Changmin said last time he saw his idiot best friend.

“Yeah, yeah, Mr. You Live Alone You Die Alone. What I’d give to travel back in time to tell your baby self not only did you get Hyung but you got Hyung pregnant with _twins_ ,” his idot best friend had said.

Changmin had smacked him upside the head a few times.

Choi Chef-hyungnim looks like he’d like to smack _Changmin_ upside of the head a few times. “Regardless,” he says, once he seems certain Changmin is actually listening to him. “Get over yourself.”

Changmin stares at him blankly. “Do people pay you for your personality?”

“No,” Choi Chef-hyungnim says. “They pay me for my cooking, which is why you called me here, yes?” He moves like he’s trying to leave the apartment.

Changmin makes a utterly broken sound and reaches for him like someone drowning. “No--Yes--I--Of course, of course--I’ll pay you--don’t leave--um--”

Choi Chef-hyungnim sighs and heads towards Changmin and Yunho’s kitchen more properly. “Don’t be silly, Changmin-ah,” he says.

Changmin stumbles after him weakly.

“What kind of friend would I be if I made you pay me?”

It’s redundant.

“A bad one,” Changmin says anyway.

\--

Yunho thinks the cheesecake is lovely.

Changmin feels like he’s got batter matted into every inch of hair on his body, but he can’t help but preen and posture when Yunho is smiling at him, one hand wrapped around spoon, and the other resting gently against the swell of the twins kicking away inside of him.

“Boob and Water Deer agree,” Yunho says, and licks the spoon.

Changmin gets stuck on that movement.

Heechul-hyung takes pity on them and shows himself and Choi Chef-hyungnim out.

“Bye Changmin,” he says. “Bye Yundol. Remember to breathe. Try Yoga. Don’t break the bed or yourselves.”

Yunho throws the spoon at him.

Changmin barely hears it clatter to the floor.

“Have you got leftover chocolate syrup?” Yunho says.

Changmin’s got both hands on the tie of the apron.

“You should come pour some on me,” Yunho says.

Changmin squeaks.

\--

Changmin is not entirely certain how he ended losing the chef hat he bought on a whim to his two-year-old daughter, but that seems to be the case, as he is no longer wearing the hat.

Instead, he is wearing his daughter.

Or rather, Taehee is very precariously perched on top of Changmin’s shoulders. She first climbed up onto one of the kitchen bar stools, then onto the kitchen counter (Changmin wept, inwardly, as he pondered down at his recipe making sure he had all of the necessary ingredients for ‘Hyung’s got a bun in the oven chocolate cheesecake,’ Minho’s name, not Changmin’s), and finally onto Changmin himself.

He’d righted her with one hand, still frowning at the ingredient list--had he gone for eggs that Sunday, or had he said he would and instead gotten distracted by parenting the demon children that were his and Yunho’s twins?--and done his best to stay utterly, utterly still.

Taehee’s been giggling ever since, feet swinging to and fro.

Changmin’s got a hand circled around her ankle and a thumb stroking over the bone.

Dohyun is on the floor beside them, wearing his own chef hat.

“Appa,” he says. “Chwang-appa. Up.”

Changmin sets down the recipe.

Taehee puts both hands in his hair and yanks. “Appa up,” she says, which is the same thing as what her brother said, but means, ‘if you so much as bend over to pick up my brother I am going to _cry_ and you will be _sorry_.’

Two has been awful period, but Dohyun at two is tiring, and Taehee at two, apparently, is the funniest thing his mother has seen in years.

“She’s _you_ ,” she’d said last week, and then laughed herself off the property.

Yunho’d bowed out with the good sense of someone living for another person.

Changmin had felt a stress headache start behind his temples.

Taehee had drooled more impressively against Changmin’s designer lapels.

Now, she yanks so hard on Changmin’s hair Changmin feels tears start in the corner of his eyes.

He smooths a hand through Dohyun’s hair in apology before reaching up to try to disengage his daughter from his hair. “Ow. Taehee-yah, gentle--at least one of your Appas needs to have hair before he turns thirty-five--”

“I heard that!” Yunho says, coming in the front door with Youngtak-hyung, who closes it behind the older man with a gentle click. He’s holding most of the groceries--eggs, Changmin’s brain points out eagerly--and he sets them down on the kitchen counter the moment they’re both inside. “I’m two years older than you.”

Yunho looks like he’s ready to try to dip down to kiss Dohyun on the forehead, and Changmin forgoes saving his hairline so that he can scoop the boy up and hold him up for easy kisses.

Dohyun giggles.

Yunho blows raspberries into his forehead for what feels like five fucking years, before switching to Taehee. “Gentle, Taehee-yah,” he says, and smooths her hands free of Changmin’s bangs.

Changmin scowls. Yunho’s always been their favorite, probably because they’re still trying to convince him he should keep feeding them (and wow if Changmin hadn’t been prepared for the supremely awkward jealousy that would invoke in him, especially given they were about to be busy with a baby that actually would need around-the-clock nursing, and Yunho’s lovely nipples were once again about to be very off limits).

Dohyun is a like a sinking weight on Changmin’s front, so he adjusts the hold he has on the kid so that he’s hugging him to his chest more than holding him up by the arms.

Dohyun kicks and laughs and is happy.

Yunho grins down at him.

Changmin’s heart is so full it could burst.

He swallows.

Taehee makes braids in his hair.

“I’m making chocolate cheesecake,” Changmin says, blushing a little despite himself.

Yunho looks startled. His stomach rumbles.

Changmin is so pleased he could float.

“Oh, um,” Yunho says, still staring at Changmin and their children with an almost embarrassed look on his face. “That’s really nice, Changminnie.”

Changmin’s eyes narrow.

Yunho’s cheeks warm.

“Nice,” Changmin says.

Youngtak-hyung starts backing frantically out of the kitchen and towards the apartment door. “Yunho, Changmin--nice to see you--”

Changmin puts up a hand, silencing him, and keeping him frozen in the foyer.

“Nice,” he says again.

Yunho winces. “I, uh. I actually just kind of want to go to McDonalds, Changdollie,” he says. “Sorry.”

The room is so silent you could hear a pin drop.

“McDonald!” says Dohyun, breaking the silence. He says it like he’s speaking Japanese and sticks a fist in the air.

Changmin somehow manages to keep holding him aloft. “McDonalds,” he says.

“Yeah,” Yunho says. “Um--but it’s fine. I can do cheesecake.” His stomach growls again, and the baby must _kick_ , again, because Yunho rubs a hand down to soothe her. “Gaseumdol--”

Taehee opens her mouth like she wants to start shouting on about her baby sibling Little Boob some more, and they only just convinced her to not go around shouting that in public when they had fans around who could write about it in multiple languages on the internet trying to figure out what it meant that Changmin sometimes tagged photos of sleeping Yunho #Gasuemdol.

Changmin feels the headache coming back. “McDonalds,” he says again, before Taehee can.

His daughter stops. Her hands leave his hair, and then resettle on Changmin’s ears.

Changmin has a sinking, horrified feeling, but he’s holding Dohyun so he can’t do more than open his mouth--

“McDonald!” Taehee shouts, and yanks on Changmin’s ears like they’re not attached to him. Like they were the world’s best toy she’s never seen or touched before, and not like she and Dohyun hadn’t come out of Yunho with their own matching sets, all the more apparent by their standard two-year-old bowl cuts.

Yunho looks at Changmin and Taehee and Dohyun and just laughs, helpless.

Changmin would flip him off, but he’s currently holding dead weight in the form of his giggling son. “Right,” he says. “I’ll get my keys.”

He sets Dohyun on the kitchen floor and moves off in search of them, Taehee still yanking on his ears and shouting ‘McDonald!’ at the top of her lungs.

“Oh, um, Changdollie, you don’t have to--Youngtak can go--”

Youngtak-hyung startles to attention but Changmin ignores him with the practiced ease of more than ten years of fighting for Yunho’s affections.

“It’s fine,” he says. “I want to go.”

“McDonald!” Taehee says again.

“You can stay with Yunho,” Changmin tells Youngtak-hyung, pocketing his keys.

He reaches for the twins’ shoes.

\--

\--

end.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So re: the fetal names for the babies. It is all explained in the next chapter, Conversations. I’m sorry I’m attached to the order of these OTL. Essentially, the Korean for deer is 'Saseum' and chest is 'Gaseum' and Changmin 'mishears' and is attached for uh, obvious reasons. I feel bad spoiling but I'm still editing the next chapter haha. 
> 
> [Tumblr masterpost](http://zimriya.tumblr.com/post/177712175310/now-hide-inside-me-author-zimriya) || [Twitter masterpost](https://twitter.com/zimriya/status/1034629115448631296).


	3. conversations

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter is set June 2021 and February 2024 respectively. The twins are two and a month. (Korean age, they’re three. Nobody ever calls me on the fact that I use Korean age tho lol idk why I’m explaining here XD.)
> 
> Betaed by Hexmen and Kinah. I made Scar make sure the kids weren’t talking too much for their ages. All other mistakes are my own.

**3\. Conversations**

\--

When they confirm Yunho’s pregnant, Changmin kind of wants to cry. They’re in a bathroom in the apartment they’ve been semi-sharing since the news came out they were married, and Yunho has peed on like three pregnancy tests with Changmin standing next to him losing feeling in his hand for moral support.

Before that, Yunho peed on four more sticks shouting things like ‘whoever designed these needs to die in a fire’ and ‘did you buy these at Daiso or did you get them online?’ and one time ‘maybe we’re not even having a baby. Maybe it’s one of your Gundams!’

Changmin had stood for the first half of the process alternating between covering his face with both hands and shouting back the answers to Yunho’s frankly astounding and probably note-worthy questions.

Yes, I bought it at a store. Yes, pregnancy tests are the worst--Kyu sent Changmin a bunch of videos of celebrities breaking the news ages ago and he thinks they can all agree they universally suck, although mostly for betas since betas don’t have the convenience of knowing the exact conception date. And, no, it isn’t going to be a Gundam what the _hell are you even talking about have you been_ fucking _my_ Gundams??

He’d also been trying not to pace.

Then he’d been in the bathroom losing feeling in his hand.

Now he’s still in the bathroom, giving as good as he’s getting with regards to any feeling in _Yunho’s_ hand, and looking down at a tiny plastic pregnancy test telling him in about thirty-eight weeks, Shim Changmin and Jung Yunho are going to be parents.

So Changmin wants to cry.

He thinks he’s allowed.

“Changmin-ah.” Yunho definitely wants to cry. Yunho has been leaking emotions since his heat ended two weeks ago at the end of May. 

Changmin squeezes his hand because he’s trying to be supportive and ground Yunho, not because he himself is so happy he could burst.

“Changminnie we’re having a _baby_ ,” Yunho says, and cries some more.

 “ _Yeah_ ,” Changmin says. He doesn’t say more. At least one of them should look moderately composed when they have to go before SM with the information.

“A _baby_ ,” Yunho says again. “We made a _baby_.”

“Yeah,” Changmin says again. “That, uh, is how that works--condoms are magic--”

“Changdol a _baby_ \--” Yunho says, and turns towards Changmin with huge, tear filled eyes.

Changmin sniffles despite himself. If he could get a hand free of Yunho’s he’d maybe push at his hair in distraction. That’s what he does on stage when Yunho looks like that, more so since they were married, and the fans could bring signs with ‘Married Shinki’ on them and not get disappointed side-eyes from the rest of the audience. “Yeah, Hyung,” he says. “We are.”

“A _baby_ ,” Yunho says again, really wetly now.

Changmin finally manages to wrestle his hand free to shove through his hair. It helps about zero percent. “Fuck,” Changmin says. “Yunho-hyung.”

Yunho swipes at his eyes a little in apology. “Sorry,” he says. Then he wipes at Changmin’s eyes.

There is a beat.

“You didn’t wash your hands,” Changmin says.

There’s another beat.

“I don’t know if you want me to respond to that,” Yunho says.

Changmin laughs at him, honestly happy to no longer be three seconds from sobbing. “You’re such an asshole, Yunho-yah,” he says. “Our kid is going to be _evil_.”

Yunho’s gaze sharpens a little like he’s going to say something particularly hilarious and on the nose; Changmin shoves two fingers into his mouth.

There is another long beat.

Yunho suckles at the digits between his lips.

The bathroom temperature goes up by several degrees Celsius.

Changmin swallows. “You still haven’t washed your hands,” he says. He pulls his hand free of Yunho’s mouth.

Yunho lets his eyes go half-lidded in seduction. “I’m not two, Changdol,” he says. “I think I know how to pee on a stick.”

Changmin snorts. “Is that something most people in their thirties are good at?”

“You are in your thirties too!”

“Also, we have got to get you books or something about toilet training, because two?”

Yunho frowns, then pouts a bit.

Changmin doesn’t cave to him. “Jihye’s had kids, Hyung,” he says. “Jungsoo-hyung’s had a kid.”

Yunho makes a face. “Jungsoo-hyung’s _married_ ,” he says, expression sour.

Changmin pokes him in the extremely concerned cheek. “Yah,” he says. “We’re married.”

“That’s different,” Yunho says. “We’re having a baby.”

“That… did not sound how you wanted it to--”

Yunho has no concerns about the various scandals he could start with his phrasing. “Changminnie, we’re _having a baby_ ,” he says again.

Changmin kisses him mostly to shut him up. “Yep,” he says. “Now are you telling Mom, or am I?”

Yunho pecks him on the mouth a few more times. “You are,” he says. “Love you.”

Changmin does love Yunho. But he isn’t going to tell his mom.

(He does. Both times. Because Jung Yunho is _the worst_.)

\--

“So… twins,” Yunho’s doctor says at their first appointment. “Definitely twins.”

Changmin remains seated.

“Told you,” Yunho says smugly. “I’m too huge for just one.”

“Yunho-hyung,” Changmin says on autopilot. “You’re not huge.” He’s been saying this since the cat was out of the bag around the third omega week, when Yunho first made the assertion that he was more than showing for three weeks, even as an omega.

Omega pregnancies, as Changmin had learned pretty quickly into the decision to have children, differed from beta pregnancies in that the exact conception date was easily accessible by virtue of heat. While beta pregnancies were counted from the last menstrual period, omega and alpha pregnancies simply used the date of conception, or end of the heat. So, three beta weeks, one omega week; four beta weeks, two omega weeks; etc.

Changmin finds the whole thing fascinating but also terrifying.

Yunho is five omega weeks along (seven, if he was a beta) and this is their first doctor’s visit.

It’s fascinating but also _terrifying_.

Yunho is staring at Changmin with stars in his eyes.

Changmin stares back. “What?” he says. “You’re not huge.”

Yunho just keeps sparkling back at Changmin.

Changmin turns towards their doctor. “Twins?” he manages.

“Twins,” the man affirms. “Definitely twins.”

Changmin stares at the ultrasound, heart racing. He stands so that he can move closer to Yunho.

His mate takes his hand and squeezes. “I _told you_ \--”

Changmin kisses him before he can help himself. “You did,” he says. “And then you blabbed to like _everyone_.”

“Only Donghae,” Yunho says petulantly. “And he was actually really good about not saying anything until Monday, anyway.”

The press release is pending this doctor’s appointment, but most everyone in the company knows because of Donghae-hyung. Changmin’s not mad. They’ve made it five weeks, and while the general rule of thumb is to wait for the end of the first trimester, they really can’t afford to keep the general public in the dark.

There’s only so many oversized shirts Yunho can wear in the middle of the Seoul summer without people getting suspicious.

Also, Jihye put her first ultrasound online immediately, and Yunho for sure is still sour that his baby sister has more children than he does.

Although, apparently, not for long.

“Hyung,” Changmin says, thumbing circles along the back of Yunho’s hand. “Jihye is going to be pissed.”

Yunho tears his eyes away from their barely formed babies in question.

“We’re about to break even with her in one go,” Changmin explains.

Yunho lifts a brow.

“Don’t act like you haven’t been annoyed.”

“Changminnie, we’re idols,” Yunho says patronizingly.

Changmin fights the urge to swat him; he’s pregnant with their children.

“Jihye is a normal girl with a normal husband and plenty of time to make babies.”

“Oh my _God_ ,” Changmin swears despite himself. “Hyung!”

Yunho’s doctor just pinches the bridge of his nose and lets them go at it. He’s been with them through pretty much everything, at this point, so Changmin almost feels bad.

“I won’t lie, though,” Yunho continues. “We win.”

“Yeah, well,” Changmin says, still a little trigger happy because he hadn’t wanted to tell anyone until they’d successfully passed out of the first trimester, where the risk of miscarriage went down to a less terrifying decimal. He and Yunho, by virtue of their two Y chromosomes, have, of course, a larger decimal to start with, but the first trimester remains the baseline.

Too bad they were having twins, Yunho was definitely going to be _showing_ , and the fact that neither of them have left the country in five weeks is starting to attract attention.

Around now they’d be talking about A-Nation, doing SM Town, or working on a new album.

Instead, they’re having a baby.

“Two babies,” Yunho says, squeezing Changmin’s hand and as good as reading his mind.

“Yeah,” Changmin says.

\--

“What are we going to name them?” Yunho says, that night, resting his head on Changmin’s chest.

Changmin had been about two seconds from falling into post-coital sleep, but he rallies himself dutifully to give Yunho his full attention. “Thing One and Thing Two?’

Yunho hums. “We’re not calling the babies ‘things,’ Changminnie.”

Changmin yawns. “Prince and Princess?” he tries.

Yunho turns to look up at him.

“Because you’re the King of the Stage,” Changmin explains, and grins when Yunho pinches him in the side. “Ow, fine. Choikang and U Know?”

“We’re not naming the babies after ourselves,” Yunho says.

Changmin keeps smiling. “That’d be cute, though.”

Yunho snorts. “Well, why don’t we name them after you, then,” he says. “Like--Water Deer and Deer.”

Changmin squints at him. “Did you say Boob?” he says.

Yunho blinks at him. “Did I say Boob?” he parrots back. “What. Changdol--”

“I like Boob,” Changmin continues. “I’m glad you’re finally embracing your chest, Yunho-hyung. I mean it’s not unheard of to bottle feed.”

Yunho opens and shuts his mouth a few times, before sitting up, cheeks bright red. “We are not bottle feeding our children,” he snaps.

Changmin nods back. “Yes, I know,” he says. “That’s what I’m saying. I’m glad you’re secure enough to call one of them Boob.”

“Deer!” Yunho enunciates. “I said Deer, not Boob--it’s a siot you asshole--”

“No, we can’t name the kid Asshole,” Changmin says.

“Ugh, fine, I guess Boob is kind of cute,” Yunho concedes, laying back down on Changmin’s chest. “It’s like. Well it’s chest, right? Like where your heart is?”

Changmin really hadn’t thought anything beyond the fact that Yunho made boob jokes too easy. Now he’s actually attached to it as a name. “My mom says that the uglier your fetal name is the prettier the child will be,” he says.

Yunho scoffs. “You sure you didn’t get that from a drama?” he says dryly.

“No, she did,” Changmin says.

“How awful was your name?” Yunho says. “Given you’re gorgeous.”

There’s a beat.

Changmin can feel his face start to heat.

Yunho lifts back up off Changmin’s chest to squint at him some more. “Was that not where you were going with this?”

“Yunho-hyung,” Changmin says miserably.

“Changminnie, it’s 2021. We all know you think you’re handsome. You strip off every tour.”

“You did it last time too!” Changmin shouts. “Leave me alone!”

“I did it because I knew we were going to be doing babies, Changmin,” Yunho tells him straightforwardly. “Please try to keep up, Changdol. I’m worried the kids will inherit your brains.”

Changmin scowls at him. “You wish they would,” he says. “They’ll be lawyers and doctors for sure.”

“Don’t you mean sportscasters?” says Yunho. “My side is the lawyer side.”

“Yeah, very funny,” Changmin says. “My side is the teacher side--the smarter side--”

“We have very smart genes,” Yunho decides finally. “Regardless. What were we talking about?”

“The fact that we’re naming them Boob and Water Deer,” Changmin says happily. “Which is adorable--I love you, Yunho-hyung.”

Yunho narrows his eyes at him. “Mmhmm,” he says. “Well I suppose it works, since you’re Bambi.”

“And you have the best chest in this house,” Changmin agrees, and twists fruitlessly away when Yunho tickles him in revenge.

It’s only after all that, when Yunho’s finally drifted off to dreamland and is snoring adorably into most of Changmin’s pillow, that Changmin lets a hand drift down the slope of his chest to rest in the jut of his hip bone. He avoids the mate-mark to keep Yunho sleeping and unaroused, and instead strokes careful fingers over the line of Yunho’s pelvis.

“Um,” he says, voice careful and quiet. “Hi. Um--I’m Changmin--” He breaks off, at a loss and more than a little embarrassed. “I’m also an idiot.”

Yunho snuffles in his sleep.

Changmin freezes.

Yunho keeps snoring.

Changmin relaxes. “I also won’t lie to you. You scare the shit out of me.” He floats his hand more solidly against the slope of Yunho’s belly, which really is starting to show a lot for five omega weeks, seven beta ones. Changmin can’t feel anything beneath the swell because of that, but he fancies he can regardless. Like how he knew without a doubt that Yunho was pregnant well before the peeing on sticks, by smell alone.  

Yunho turns his head a little so that he’s facing the ceiling instead of Changmin, still snoring.

Changmin doesn’t do more than flick his eyes up towards him to check on his breathing, before going back to gazing down at the lump that is his children. “I can’t wait to meet you, though,” he whispers. “I--uh--well--”

“Changmin-ah,” Yunho says, clearly taking pity on Changmin, but also not opening his eyes. “This is adorable, but they really cannot hear you.”

Changmin feels a blush start high on his cheekbones. “You’re hearing things,” he says. “You’re dreaming.”

“Uh huh,” Yunho says, still not opening his eyes.

Changmin more aggressively cuddles him and closes his own eyes. “I’m your dad,” he mumbles into the crown of Yunho’s head anyway, ignoring the way Yunho smiles into his neck.

\--

“You have to be very quiet,” Changmin says, holding both of his children by their too-tight gripping hands.

It’s well past bedtime, but neither of them were asleep when Changmin wandered by to locate his idiot, pregnant husband, and instead of taking the time to read them into mildly complacent sleep, Changmin had decided to take them along.

Taehee seems the most excited about this, practically buzzing out of her skin at Changmin’s side, while Dohyun stands complacently at Changmin’s other side with a thumb in his mouth even at three years, and looking like the only reason he was awake was because he had to share a room with his sister.

“Okay, Appa,” Taehee tells Changmin. He has to give it to her; her voice is lowered.

“Right,” Changmin says, eyeing the lump that is Yunho, fallen asleep on the couch in front of what definitely looks like their last tour DVD. “Your father is embarrassing.”

Taehee laughs at him, then covers her mouth with the hand not strangling Changmin’s. “Sorry.”

Changmin smiles down at her, too charmed for his own good. “Maybe I lied,” he says. “You don’t have to be that quiet.”

Yunho snores particularly loudly from the couch, shifting a little bit in a way that unseats the remote from his protruding belly. Changmin spares a brief thought for the man’s cock, slowly disappearing behind the self of his midsection, before tugging his children into the living room.

“Yun-appa is a very deep sleeper,” he explains.

Taehee stares back at him with wide eyes.

Dohyun pulls his thumb free of his mouth. “No,” he says, with the tone of a three-year-old who has been caught sneaking out of bed by said Yun-appa more than once.

Changmin fights back a grin. “Well, only when he’s pregnant,” he concedes. “You should ask Kyuhyun-samchon for the photo proof.”

Yunho might kill him, but Changmin finds the photos of that time Kyuline played jenga on pre-birth Taehee and Dohyun hilarious, if not proof that just because nobody present was allowed to have alcohol because the love of Changmin’s life was pregnant, sleep deprivation and the slow realization that in literally days Changmin was going to be a real life _father_ could ruin lives far more than any beer could.

Taehee tugs free of Changmin to stand in front of Yunho, frowning. She’s wearing the deer pajamas that Yunho got her for last Christmas. It is adorable.

“Chwang-appa… Yun-appa… up?” she says, stringing the words together in some semblance of correct sentence structure and still frowning down at Yunho.

Changmin would, but Changmin would also like to not throw out his back.

“Chwang-appa… Yun-appa… break,” Dohyun says, in perfect mirror to Taehee. He disappears from Changmin’s side to stand next to his twin, then holds out a hand overtop the baby bump and meets Taehee’s eyes evenly. “Little Boob.”

Changmin pinches the bridge of his nose. “Taehee-yah,” he says, even though Dohyun was the one who said it. “What have I told you about calling your sister Little Boob.”

“Chwang-appa,” his daughter protests, finally looking away from her twin. “Dohyunnie said.”

Changmin lets down his hand and comes to stand next to them. “I guess it is kind of cute, Gaseumdol.” His lips quirk just thinking about the moment Taehee christened the latest Shim, and the look on Yunho’s face. Changmin had tried fruitlessly to disengage from the early morning puppy pile. Yunho played dirty and elbowed him in the dick to prevent this, spitting through gritted teeth about how this was all Changmin’s fault for naming Dohyun ‘Gaseum’ in the first place.

“Little Boob,” Taehee and Dohyun chorus, staring down at their soon to be sibling with huge eyes.

Yunho stops snoring briefly, and his brow furrows.

Changmin’s breath catches. He reaches down past his children to touch the span of his husband’s belly in time to catch the tail end of the kick.

“Kids,” he says. “Look. It’s your sister.”

Taehee and Dohyun reach around his hand with surprisingly calmness and carefulness. “Hi,” Taehee says. “Little Boob.”

The baby kicks again.

Yunho is definitely going to kill them all, once he stops fake sleeping.

Taehee and Dohyun are too busy staring down at the wonder that is their soon-to-be sibling to notice, but Changmin definitely catches the sliver of his husband’s eyes as he takes in his audience. “You should say hi,” he tells his children, smirking at Yunho.

Yunho keeps utterly still throughout the sudden onslaught of twins touching him, but sticks his tongue out at Changmin anyway.

Taehee has launched into a nonsensical tirade too big for her three years about the newest toys that Heechul-oppa got her--

“Oppa!” Changmin squawks to himself, horrified, and this time Yunho does laugh at him.

\--and Dohyun just sort of nods along with his big sister and strokes tiny circles around Yunho’s protruding belly button.

Through it all, Changmin keeps making eyes down at Yunho, and Yunho keeps his eyes half open and from laughing like the trained professional celebrity he is.

Then Dohyun trips, stumbling over Changmin's foot and falling across Yunho immediately, and Changmin stops pulling faces at his husband so that he can save his husband, pulling Dohyun up into his arms and tapping Taehee on the head with another hand.

“Oops, sorry Yun-appa,” Dohyun says, dangling from Changmin’s arms.

Taehee turns to face them, shocked, clearly not having realized Yunho was awake.

Yunho opens his eyes and shifts himself into more of an upward position. “It’s okay, Dohyun-yah,” he says.

Changmin shifts the boy around so that he’s better held in his arms, and then drops them both down onto the sofa next to Yunho.

Taehee clambers up on Yunho’s other side immediately.

“Sorry, Little Boob,” Dohyun says, tapping Yunho on the belly.

The baby definitely kicks, because Yunho winces, Dohyun’s eyes light up, and Taehee reaches around to touch some more. She starts talking again, this time about her cousins, because Jihye and Yunho’s mother came to visit the other day and they brought gifts.

Changmin loosens his hold on Dohyun and meets Yunho’s pleased, eyes.

“Sorry,” he says gently, as the kids talk over themselves to their unborn sister. “They weren’t sleeping, and I didn’t feel like reading a story.”

Yunho drops an arm around Taehee without so much as a pause. “Uh huh,” he says. “Are you sure it’s not just because if you had to read _The Giving Tree_ one more time you were going to burn all copies of it?”

Changmin narrows his eyes and looks towards the TV. On screen, his 2014 self is standing decked out in the opening costume cape with his terrible ramen hair. Clearly he was wrong. It wasn’t one of their more recent tour DVDs. It was an old one, and only because Changmin let slip to the kids that the _Tree_ tour was based on a book. “That’s cold, Yunho-yah.”

Yunho grins at him.

Changmin really wants to kiss him.

Taehee and Dohyun stop babbling at their sister and meet each other’s eyes. “Gross,” Dohyun says. “Appadeul.”

“Oh, Appaduel, are we,” Yunho says, reaching out to tickle their son.

Changmin squawks in response; as the lap-seat, he takes the brunt of the damage when Dohyun starts squirming.

Taehee just turns giant, unfair eyes on the both of them.

Yunho is unbothered. “See that in the mirror every day, my love,” he says.

Changmin is not. “Holy fuck it is unfair they got your eyes,” he says.

Yunho elbows him in the side. “Changdollie. Language,” he says.

Changmin stands with Dohyun, sets the boy on the ground, and reaches around to haul a squealing, laughing Taehee into an over the shoulder carry. “You let them go out with Heechul-hyung,” he says, roaring a little for show when Dohyun attaches himself to Changmin’s left leg.

Taehee is practically upside down and still laughing, and now Dohyun is giggling in time with every over exaggerated step Changmin takes.

Yunho remains seated on the couch, smiling. “Don’t mind me,” he says. “I’m just too pregnant to get up by myself, so you can just come back and get me when you’re finished reading _The Giving Tree_.”

Taehee and Dohyun stops laughing abruptly and turn abject puppy dog eyes on their father.

Changmin stops walking with them both and allows Taehee down so that she can better stare Yunho down.

“But we want Yun-appa to read,” she says.

Changmin reaches down to snag Dohyun, holding the both of them with one arm under their butts, the other around their waists. He adds in his own puppy dog eyes.

Yunho folds like an extremely poorly built house of cards. He stands, groaning, and goes waddling towards the three of them. “Fine,” he says.

Changmin sets the twins down so that they can race to their bedroom.

“But if you want to even try to make a fourth one, you will never do that again--”

“I can’t hear you,” Changmin says. “Speak up?”

Yunho punches him in the arm on his way past.

Changmin snags him around the waist, chin nuzzled into his shoulder, hands rounded around their unborn daughter.

She kicks for him.

Yunho makes a face. “She absolutely loves you more than me.”

Changmin is grateful Yunho can’t see him smile. “Mmm, you’re a liar,” he says. “She loves you more for sure.”

“Yeah, okay,” Yunho says. “She only kicks when you ask her to--”

“Because it annoys you, Hyung-ah,” Changmin says, taking great pleasure in how effectively the nickname silences Yunho. “And she definitely gets that from me.”

Yunho puts his hand on top of Changmin’s in time for the baby to kick again. “Our Little Boob,” he says.

Changmin gives it two seconds, before snaking his hand up to cop a feel.

“Changdol-ah!” Yunho shrieks, voice reaching unheard octaves.

Changmin doesn’t feel guilty at all about running away from him, taking advantage of the fact that Yunho cannot chase him.

By the time Yunho comes into the twin’s room, Changmin is settled on the floor next to their bed, the picture of innocence. Yunho’s chair sit next to the bedside suitably fluffed up with pregnancy pillows.

Taehee and Dohyun are under the covers and waiting.

 _Will kill you_ , Yunho mouths at Changmin, before settling down to read.

 _Love you_ , Changmin mouths back at him, and takes Yunho’s hand somewhere around the second page.

Taehee and Dohyun don’t make it past the third.

Changmin and Yunho stare at them with mirrored smiles.

“Still want to kill me?” Changmin says.

Yunho reaches out to brush stray hair from Taehee’s eyes, and fiddle with the fall of Dohyun’s pajama top. “No,” he says. “Yes. Maybe. After you give me a fourth one,” he decides.

Changmin stands with minimal groaning and pulls Yunho to his feet as well. “Uh huh,” he says. “Keep telling yourself that.”

Yunho lets Changmin lead him back to bed, humming. “Love you, Changdollie,” he says.

Changmin puts his hand on Yunho’s belly and kisses him again, in the doorway. “Love you too, Yunho-yah,” he says. “And you--” He taps against Yunho’s belly button.

“Changmin-ah,” Yunho says. “This is adorable, but she really can’t hear you.”

Changmin laughs.

\--

end.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So. Fetal names. This is /semi/ explained in fic, and in Chapter 2, but, basically: Taehee and Dohyun's fetal names are '고라니/Gorani' or 'Water Deer' and '가슴/Gaasuem or 'Heart/Chest/Boob.' This is because Yunho was trying to say '사슴/Saseum' or 'Deer' and Changmin uh. Misheard.
> 
> When they had to name Yeonhee, they asked Taehee, who said, "What were Dohyunie and I?"
> 
> And when they returned 'Boob' and 'Water Deer': "Which was me?"
> 
> "Water Deer--Taeehee-yah.
> 
> "Gaseumdol/Little Boob."
> 
> In short, Homin's kids are Water Deer and two boobs. You're welcome. 
> 
> [Tumblr masterpost](http://zimriya.tumblr.com/post/177712175310/now-hide-inside-me-author-zimriya) || [Twitter masterpost](https://twitter.com/zimriya/status/1034629115448631296).


	4. dust

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Note: This is Jaejoong POV. Sorry, I realllly didn’t want to tag for him in the fic tags itself, so IT’S HERE instead. 
> 
> I’m not even sorry for how self indulgent this is okay. I wrote it in a fugue state because if there’s one thing I love more than outsider POV it’s unrequited outsider POV. Pours more salt in that wound. 
> 
> This chapter is set early December 2023. The twins are nearly two, or three in Korean age.
> 
> Betaed by Hexmen and Kinah. I made Scar make sure the kids weren’t talking too much for their ages. All other mistakes are my own.

**4\. Dust**

\--

Jaejoong’s ruminating in front of the cereal when it happens: a girl, dressed entirely in blue, pokes him on the leg and says, “You’re Kim Jaejoong. You’re bad.” 

Jaejoong blinks.

She’s speaking banmal, but kids do that sometimes, and she’s definitely  _someone’s_  because her outfit is spotless and she has two frankly adorable blue bows in her hair. 

She’s also scowling up at him.

“Um,” Jaejoong says. “Are you lost?” 

“You’re bad,” the girl reiterates, and kicks Jaejoong in the shin. 

It’s not a hard kick. Mostly, Jaejoong is just surprised. “Ow,” he says anyway, because you do that with kids, around the same time Shim Changmin rounds the corner. 

“Dohyun-ah,” Jaejoong’s former bandmate is saying, not really looking where he’s going. “We’re trying to find your sister. This is not helping.”

A boy--Dohyun-ah, evidently--has both feet planted on Changmin’s left foot and is holding onto his thigh, having the time of his life. He’s swinging back and forth which each step Changmin takes, giggling and gasping through his joy. Jaejoong thinks Changmin has to be taking purposefully slow and long steps because of this, despite his chastisements.

“Dohyun-ah.”

“I can’t believe you lost one,” another voice adds overtop the laughter, and Jaejoong looks to the side to realize rather abruptly that of course: Yunho is with Changmin. 

Last Jaejoong heard TVXQ was on hiatus because of Yunho’s second pregnancy, and clearly the press had not actually been lying. Jaejoong thinks it’s been at least five months, maybe even all of two trimesters, but Yunho somehow manages to still be youthful and glowing and looking like every good thing Jaejoong squandered for greed. He would bet this time around there won't be twins, however, because he’s also significantly less round.

But that means the girl, pretty and perfect with her blue dress and her blue bows and her frankly pristine looking stockings running around supermarkets kicking ‘Kim Jaejoongs’ in the shin must be Dohyun’s sister.

Shim--

“Taehee-yah,” Changmin says at the same time the girl leaves Jaejoong’s side to run back to the man and hury her face in his stomach. “What have I told you about running off?”

Dohyun is still standing on Changmin’s other leg, but Changmin just shifts his weight a little so that he can hold his daughter by the back of the head.

“It’s bad,” Taehee mutters, words slurred together with childish insolence. “But Appa--”  

“Ah ah,” Changmin says. “What have I told you about buts?” 

Yunho chokes on an interjection but Changmin remains steadfast in his parenting.

Taehee’s mouth closes and she digs her face more solidly into Changmin’s side. “Sorry.” 

At their side, Yunho is grinning now. “To be fair, you were the one who lost her--”

Taehee lifts her head joyously at the same time Changmin’s takes a hand off his daughter to point at the other man menacingly. 

“Don’t you dare  _undermine_  me--”

“It’s not my fault you’re wrapped around my finger, Changdol--”

“Yeah, Chwang-appa!” Dohyun and Taehee chorus.

“Yeah, Changmin-appa,” Yunho repeats after them, eyes beautifully fond. 

Changmin looks back at him like they’re the only two people in the world.

Jaejoong clears his throat. 

“Thank you--oh,” Changmin says, first turning towards Jaejoong, and then _seeing_ him. “It’s you.” His voice starts formal and ends up short and to the point, the effect of which only slightly ruined by the twins giggling in response.

Jaejoong’s stomach starts to knot. He’s not sure how he managed to forget how attractive Changmin is, nor how little patience the man has for bullshit.

Changmin shows absolutely zero intention of continuing his sentence, let alone his gratitude. 

Jaejoong swallows. 

“Thank you Jaejoong-ssi,” says Yunho finally, breaking the awkward silence, and earning a betrayed look from Changmin. 

From his _husband_ , Jaejoong remembers suddenly, because if the children weren’t enough, the wedding ring Changmin is all of a sudden making sure to show off as he smooths through his daughter’s hair and shifts under his son’s full body weight definitely would serve as a reminder. 

“Dohyun-ah,” the man chastens finally.

Dohyun steps off of Changmin’s toes with a bowed, guilty head. He takes Yunho’s hand.

Yunho doesn’t so much as pause, interlacing their fingers and moving so that when Dohyun goes to hide behind his legs, nobody over-balances. 

Jaejoong doesn’t know where to look.

“Yun-appa,” Taehee whispers, saving him the silence. “That’s Kim Jaejoong.” 

A muscle in Changmin’s jaw twitches.

“He’s bad,” Taehee continues, before putting her face back into Changmin’s stomach.

Her father looks too proud for words. “Oof.” He doesn’t say more, just smirks at Jaejoong like he’s won the lottery.

Jaejoong is left with Yunho, who smiles winningly. “Sorry,” he says. 

“Don’t apologize,” Changmin definitely mutters.

“We didn’t raise her to be this rude,” Yunho continues over top him, and stomps on Changmin’s foot. It’s the same one Dohyun had been standing on, so Changmin appears entirely unbothered.

But Yunho does as well, still smiling at Jaejoong like he’s at a press conference surrounded by reporters and public.

Taehee giggles.

Changmin puts his hand back on her head between the bows. “We did so,” he mutters. “Good girl.”

Yunho’s smile slips.

Jaejoong feels so awkward he kind of wants to die. 

“Thank you for finding Taehee,” Yunho decides finally. He gives up on the smile and rubs at the back of his neck awkwardly with the hand not attached to his son.

Jaejoong really can’t help but look at him, the full shape of him, and it’s a struggle to keep his eyes on the man’s face. “She found me, actually,” he corrects to fill the space. 

Changmin’s nostrils flare; for a second Jaejoong actually fears for his life, but then Taehee looks up at her father. 

“Appa? Are you Siwon-samchon?” 

There’s a beat.

Jaejoong has to work very hard to trace that particular inside joke back to his long gone past, and in that time, Changmin seems to have given up like he can’t help himself.

Even Yunho rolls his eyes, but Jaejoong can’t so much as digest that, because he’s too busy being floored by the sight that is Shim Choikang Changmin, one half of South Korea’s pride and joy power couple, pretending to be a horse. There’s even nickering, pawing at the ground, and hair tossing.

Taehee and Dohyun find this entire thing hilarious.

Jaejoong hasn’t got the words for it.

“This is why I let him have another one,” Yunho tells Jaejoong like a secret, like they’ll be friends again, and Changmin is scowling and abandoning pretense to take his husband by the hand to tug him close before Jaejoong can so much as _savor it_.

“Don’t tell him that--thank you for finding Taehee--” There’s absolutely no warmth in Changmin’s tone, only superficial, idol manners and an absolutely fake smile thrown back towards Jaejoong as they start to walk. 

It’s a dismissal.

“But Changdol--” Yunho sounds bemused, but he’s not disputing the end of the conversation, nodding back towards Jaejoong a little before turning his attention back to his other half.

“Stop talking, Yunho-hyung,” Changmin continues out of the side of his mouth. He smiles once more at Jaejoong as he starts herding his family along with one hand on Yunho’s back. 

The twins go running at full speed in the aisle ahead of them, and Jaejoong rather abruptly realizes they’re wearing matching shades of blue down to the tennis shoes, which must have cost more than Jaejoong’s last variety salary, and are also definitely brand name. 

They both have Changmin’s ears. 

They both have Yunho’s eyes.

Jaejoong’s stomach hurts. 

“Taehee-yah, Dohyun-ah--no running!” Yunho calls out after them, pressed close into Changmin’s side. “No, we can’t go home, Changdol. We haven't bought anything yet--ow--stop that,” the man says, laughing as Changmin definitely bites him on the neck. 

The four of them round the corner. 

Jaejoong stares after them for a while, then goes back to his cereal.

He has a feeling it won’t matter which one he picks; they’ll all taste like ash in his mouth.  

\--

end.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Shim Taehee, light of my life, fruit of Shim Changmin's loins, walking up to random ppl in supermarkets to kick them because I CAN /mic drops and runs away.
> 
> [Tumblr masterpost](http://zimriya.tumblr.com/post/177712175310/now-hide-inside-me-author-zimriya) || [Twitter masterpost](https://twitter.com/zimriya/status/1034629115448631296).


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